Demand Based Pricing: Described methods belong to the category of demand / market based pricing:-

1. What the Traffic can Bear' Pricing

2. Skimming Pricing

3. Penetration Pricing

• What the Traffic can Bear' Pricing: The seller takes the maximum price that the customers are eager to pay for the product under the given circumstances. This technique is used more by retail traders and than by manufacturing firms. This method brings big profits in the short term objective. But in the long run it is not a safe concept; chances of errors in judgment are very high.

• Skimming Pricing:This method aims at high profits & high price in the early stage of marketing the product. It gainfully taps the opportunity for selling at high prices to those segments of the market, which do not bother much regarding the price. This particular method is very useful in the pricing of new products, especially those that have a luxury or specialty elements.

• Penetration Pricing: Penetration pricing seeks to gain greater market penetration throughout relatively low price. This method is also helpful in pricing of new products under definite circumstances. For instance :when the new product is capable of bringing in large volume of sales, but it is not a luxury item and there is no affluent / price insensitive segment, the firm can select the penetration pricing and make large size sales at a reasonable price before competitors enter the market having a similar product. Penetration pricing in such type of cases will help the firm have a good coverage of the market and keep competition out for some time.

The price elasticity of demand is taken into account in all of the demand based pricing methods, indirectly or directly. Price elasticity of demand refers to the relative sensitivity of demand for a product to changes in its value in other words how significantly the sales of the product are affected when price is changed. If decrease or increase in the price of the product results in significant increase or decrease the product is said to be price elastic conversely, if price change does not considerably affect the sales volume, a product is called to be price inelastic.